No Light
by MasterPassionCreed
Summary: It's mad and absurd, wonderful and pointless. It's just wrong. But it can't be helped. Shivering Isles - Thadon/Syl


_No Light_

Nothing is holier than colours. Thadon loves his world because of them – colours are all around, and he can always command them to be bright. Rainbows are beside him, in him, whether he's drinking or painting or smelling new sights. That is his realm, he loves it. Then there is hers; and he loves her.

She is small and afraid, with the same elven bones as him, and her eyes are so fragile that you'd think tears will burn them sometime. Her actions, however, have the energy of nobody else in these lands.

He is Duke of Mania, but when he looks at her he disagrees with the world. The people of New Sheoth can see everyone's madness but theirs; they call her a paranoid and a nuisance, caring about her delicious tortures alone. But they must be blind, he thinks, not to share with her the cleverest of fears.

There's a shade of perfection in Dementia; it's the other side of reality, and Syl couldn't be a better symbol of it all. Fear of your enemies, strength on your subjects. If put together, as Sheogorath commands, their two realms can melt in a whole, complete universe.

She feels even frailer in his arms, but she's stronger than daylight when she kisses his lips, accepting them just as they are. And they embrace quietly when other ears cannot watch their words, while their whispers rise to meet each other's distorted souls, deep in the night of folly.

It shouldn't be like this – in the Shivering Isles everything, even them, happens to be out of place. Still, they close their eyes and touch on anyway.  
It's mad and absurd, wonderful and pointless. It's just wrong. But it can't be helped.

It's up to him now. He may as well dive in a world of addictions, run away, forget his pain as he always did. He feels he just can't.

His city is torn apart now; the hands of a stranger are driving Dementia away, more and more distant, detached. This is how Syl's wounds bleed on his very body, so fresh that the pain reaches his dimmed mind in its depths.

The Madgod can't hide he's clearly losing his madness – well, that was the worst of his fears and the truest of his suspects. His eyes are choking him with their intolerable levity.

Thadon needs light, he needs smoke and blood. He needs open air. What door to take won't make a difference now, since they are all in danger.  
It takes but a couple of steps, a piece of dark street, and he is already lost in the crumbling of this world.

He hadn't seen Crucible in what seems to be thousands of mortal years. His gold shines so out of place today; people are shaken out of their indifferent folly, amazed and silenced, as he walks past the doors of New Sheoth.

As much as he worries for his throne and his forever lost joy, Thadon fears his god more than anything else. He fears reason, against whom his words can't help but fall from his lips. He knows what to do; he really has no idea what to say.

One thing is surely clear to him, though – now that he has lost it, he recognises the order. Under the waves of drugs and drunkenness, it has been there all his life. Every day a new colourful adventure, a new mood, yes; but the backbone never changed before, and now he wants it back.  
He wants her back.

His tears are so transparent now. He can't help winning by this new lord's side – the moment will come when, under the surprised eyes of the dying hero, Thadon will tear his heart out and sacrifice it to his burning pain.  
Thadon holds a sword and wears a flawless armor; he has rivers down his eyelashes, and lips yell for vengeance. Thadon, however, is happy.

Lord Jyggalag won't sweep madness away. He is reason itself, and madness is his darkest part – he'll let all wrong things fade into him, cancelling what's left of a corrupted realm.

His magic and his blade pour their rage on the unlucky human. He was deceived, poor soul, by a falling god – he will die for it, just like her, without ever knowing why. He has no mercy for an assassin. Still, his heart is bleeding.

Thadon remembers his life – he will never forget his home, nor won't let go of his throne. The images flow in his eyes as he wounds grow in number; there is his blood, his rebel, poisoned blood, already escaping his veins to reunite with the raging waters of Sheogorath. He can't stop wondering why, blind with pain. Why it all became so terrible, when it was so beautiful, he fears he'll never know for the rest of time. But this he knows for sure – her fate was but the first tragedy, the last warning, right before everything else followed her in death.

When he collapses to the ground he knows it's over. But this ray of light, this newborn idea, must come from his Lord – he thinks straight, for the first time, and the last smile dawns on his white lips.

Maybe, just maybe, the answers he's been looking for are somewhere else. Maybe they have fled too; maybe they've all run under the surface, just beyond the white veil that enclosed his life all the way long. And if his twitching fingers can't patch his wounds, his death will see to it, and will help him cross a barrier.

He's journeying to the other side. That's the side where everything is dark and gloomy, but at ease; a side holding unfortunate souls who, at last, are finished with their suffering. That's where he will find his whole dead world; that's where they aren't anymore, yet still are, in silence and peace. That's where she is now.

Thadon is happy.

* * *

_Curiously enough, I've come across many pairings in late 2011, and yet this is the one that broke my heart to the farthest extent, even with little more than zero background. I can't tell why, not for sure; but the setting and their personalities must be involved with the main reasons._  
_ Well, _that_ was unexpected in first place. For some curious chance I didn't hear rumours of their affair, nor did I even dream of matching them as a couple. But I chose to be Duke of Dementia to spare my drug-addicted friend (and because the Ritual of Mania sounded too gruesome for my tastes, TBH), and then, during Thadon and Sheogorath's argument, I understood something was definitely wrong. When, in Roots of Madness, he yelled: "My beloved Syl would be standing next to me!", I swear I nearly dropped my controller. I felt so awfully bad for them._  
_And oh I love Thadon to bits. I'm a bit colder towards Syl, but HOW not to adore such an artistic junkie as him? XD_  
_I know for sure that this story won't be found by many Shivering fans, especially on Tumblr, but it doesn't matter. I'll share the love anyway. 3 The title comes from the amazing song _**No Light, No Light by Florence + The Machine**_. It inspired me all along.  
P.S.: Trying paragraphs so that the text is more readable. Tell me what you think!  
_


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